the most important people shaping technology today
TRANSCRIPT
The Most Important People Shaping Technology Today
www.timedigital.com
1. Amazon.com
Jeff Bezos NET WORTH $7 billion
THE STOREKEEPERFounder and CEO
AGE 35
Amazon.com• 1999 is the Year of E C, Amazon.com is
prime mover• adds customers so fast that it doesn't have
time to make money• staked out the book market, to the horror of
off-line leader Barnes & Noble• expand Microsoft-like into nearly everyone
else's business• Music and video competitors CDNow and
N2K had to merge to fight off Amazon's challenge
Amazon.com• move into toys and electronics • build a network of 800,000-sq.-ft. warehouses
across the country optimized for 10 times as many sales as it does today
• Where Bezos doesn't build, he buys• millions of customers, powerful currency in
negotiating deals for partial control of EC start-ups as Drugstore.com and Pets.com
• Bezos set off for Seattle in 1994, writing the business plan for Amazon.com on the fly
• rewrite the book on e-commerce
2. America Online
Steve CaseNET WORTH $650 million
THE MESSENGERChairman and CEO
NET WORTH $650 millionAGE 41
America Online• subscribers grew to 20 million in 1999
• signed up new buddies : Netscape; Mirabilis (ICQ); Nullsoft (Winamp)
• faces toughest questions: how to combat a resurgent msn, (offer cheap--or even free-- Internet access)
• Forget Microsoft. The real battle may be with Excite@Home, high-speed cable isp.
• AOL needs to be here before it can be Everywhere
3. Microsoft Corp.
Bill Gates Chairman and CEO
NETWORTH $85 billionAGE 43
ADDRESS www.microsoft.com
Microsoft Corp.• his personal fortune reached $100 billion• will Microsoft win its antitrust trial?• Microsoft still dominates the desktop and
profits rising at 30% each year• Gates turn his chief lieutenant, 19-year
Microsoft veteran Steve Ballmer, into the public face of Microsoft– A big, brash man who yelled so much that he needed throat surgery– With earplugs, the public will love him
• forging a $5 billion deal with AT&T for a stake in the future of cable Net access
4. Transmeta Corp.
Linus Torvalds THE FATHER OF LINUX
ProgrammerAGE 29
LINUX• Some people are born to lead millions. Others are
born to write world-changing software. Only one person does both: Torvalds
• invented the alternative operating system Linux and gave away the source code free
• Eight years later, Linux is challenging Microsoft's dominance of the O.S. market
• 13% of companies use it on at least some of their computers and 17% of all servers run on it
• IBM, Dell, Intel, Oracle and Compaq are gearing up to support Linux
LINUX• Version 2.4, is the most user-friendly version yet,
with support for both usb and FireWire• Linux is going to make serious inroads into the
consumer-oriented PC market• the open-source model is spreading to other
projects, from computer games to Web browsers• Torvalds has moved on to the Next Big Thing.
His offices is rumored to be working on a superchip that will take on Intel in the microprocessor market
5. eBay
Meg Whitman THE NEW AUCTIONEER
President and CEONET WORTH $900 million
AGE 43ADDRESS www.ebay.com
eBay• Anyone who has heard the words new
economy can get the first lesson from eBay
• could become a $52 billion industry by 2002
• Meg Whitman move eBay beyond used baby clothes to a broader marketplace for personal and commercial goods
• take out an insurance policy to protect buyers and sellers from fraud
• she's courting traditional retailers so people can buy new things, not just garage-sale-type stuff
eBay• Whitman's main job these days is keeping track
of the competition, including Amazon's new auction site and Priceline's new car auctions
• 5.6 million users and an estimated $2.7 billion worth of goods changing hands by year's end
• eBay wants to stay the undisputed online-auction leader
• Big-ticket items, such as cars, will move to a new Great Collections area of the site this fall. Regional auctions will expand into 50 cities by year's end
6. Dell Computer
Michael Dell PC PRODIGY
Founder, chairman and CEONET WORTH $21.5 billion
AGE 34
Dell Computer
• other computer makers are feeling the free-PC squeeze
• Dell Web store ringing up $14 million a day
• started with $1,000 when Dell was a 19-year-old University of Texas dropout
• Dell's U.S. market share is 16.4%, up from 13% in 1998--a hair shy of Compaq's 16.8%.
• annual earnings have grown 40% for the past three years
Dell Computer• jumped 58% second quarter of 1999, result of
move into lucrative business markets (servers)
• consumer-PC: low-inventory, build-to-order approach to online retailing
• for competitors, it's a matter of do it too or die
• Dell launched gigabuys.com, a consumer-tech superstore
• user-friendly online tech support
• offer customers a cable modem or a DSL modem with their PC purchase
7. Cisco Systems
John Chambers INTERNET PLUMBER
President and CEOAGE 50
NET WORTH $200 millionADDRESS www.cisco.com
Cisco Systems• all voice and video will eventually migrate
to an open, packet-switched system like that used by the Internet
• Cisco also sells the most equipment over the Net: annual online sales have passed $10 billion
• Chambers buy promising networking start-ups. --$100 invested in 1990 is now worth $34,000
Cisco Systems
• entire Cisco division is devoted to assimilating acquisitions
• more than 30 companies obtained since 1993
• Just as IBM exits the market, other computer manufacturers like Hewlett-Packard are eager to sell more networking gear. And Microsoft has long wished to turn Windows NT into an OS for routers. To keep Cisco at the top, Chambers will have to keep buying into the next wave.
8. Apple Computer Inc.; Pixar Animation Studios
Steve Jobs APPLE POLISHER
Co-founder and interim CEO; chairman and CEONET WORTH $1.5 billion
AGE 44ADDRESS www.apple.com
Apple Computer Inc.
• After delivering knockout punch by introducing the iMac, he has brought out its seductively cute sibling, the portable iBook.
• Meanwhile, he's still hanging on to the top job at his award-winning animation studio, Pixar
• Jobs has always been one to think different• Toy Story's• If sales of the iBook come anywhere close to
those of iMac, Jobs will have a winner on his hands. Sounds as if Apple isn't doomed
9. AT&T
C. Michael Armstrong TELECOM TITAN
CEOAGE 61
ADDRESS www.att.com
AT&T• Michael Armstrong charged ahead with a
strategy to own the most valuable information pipeline into your home: your cable line.
• to acquire MediaOne, venerable Ma Bell positioned itself to become the nation's largest cable provider
• BEST LINE "I'm proud to be a cable guy." • AT&T inherited a 26% stake in voting shares of
cable-access company Excite@Home as well as a contract to market Excite@Home's service through 2002
10. id Software
John Carmack GAME GURU
Owner and Lead ProgrammerAGE 28
id Software• Castle Wolfenstein, Doom and most
recently the Quake series are among his creations.
• "experts" testify that first-person shooter games train children to be merciless and efficient snipers
• but the Marines are convinced: they have trained fighters with Carmack's games for years
id Software
• Quake III, due out this fall, will feature faster, more detailed play as well as smarter enemies and less Internet lag
• Quake III is targeted at the mainstream gamer rather than the hard-core fan. It's unlikely to be fragged by political backlash.
11. Sun Microsystems
Scott McNealy JAVA BARKER
Chairman and CEONET WORTH $1 billion
AGE 45www.sun.com
Sun Microsystems• McNealy, the leader of Silicon Valley‘s
Everyone-but-Bill alliance• He teamed up with America Online to divvy up
the rebel forces of Netscape• with aol's millions of consumers as a ready test
bed for new technologies coming out of Sun's labs
• Sun bought Star Division, a German software firm that makes applications software that competes with Microsoft's popular Office package.
Sun Microsystems• Sun's valuation is sitting pretty at $60 billion
• Sun built its name on hardware. But Java's popularity is rising, and Netscape adds to Sun's software arsenal
12. Intel Corp
Craig Barrett CHIP CHIEF
President, CEO and COONET WORTH $400 million
AGE 60ADDRESS www.intel.com
Intel Corp• averaged 27% annual profit margins for the
past quarter-century
• Last year it made $6 billion in profits
• Craig Barrett expects that PCs will still be around in 10 years
• biggest profits coming from the Web and the new devices being built to link it to consumers
• low-power StrongARM chips will be in both cheap info-appliances and high-end networking hubs
Intel Corp• launched a services division to host e-
commerce sites
• he's waging a price war with PC-chip rival AMD
• boosted production of low-cost Celeron chips
• dropped prices on faster chips as much as 40% when AMD introduced its Athlon processor
• The road to the Internet is paved with silicon
13. Yahoo! Inc.
Jerry Yang KEEPER OF THE LIST
Co-Founder and Chief YahooNET WORTH $3 billion
AGE 30www.yahoo.com
Yahoo! Inc.• There is no center!
• if Yahoo is not the center, then it is certainly--in webspeak--the main hub
• What started in 1994 as a list (updated daily) of Web destinations solidified its lead this year as the people's portal
• Notable acquisitions this year include Geocities, a thriving community of homegrown websites, and Broadcast.com, a popular streaming audio-video source
Yahoo! Inc.• Both strengthen Yahoo's position against
chief competitors AOL and the Microsoft Network
• Partnered with Sprint PCS to deliver the Web to cell phones, Yahoo is poised to become a major player if and when wireless data take off
14. E*Trade
Christos Cotsakos E-BROKER
Chairman and CEOADDRESS www.etrade.com
AGE 51
E*Trade• isn't the biggest online brokerage (that's
Charles Schwab), but it's the biggest wavemaker
• Christos Cotsakos set E*Trade on a warp-speed track toward owning every possible online financial transaction
• While Merrill Lynch's brokers were just getting adjusted to being online, Cotsakos was snapping up an e-bank, creating a mutual-fund family and buying a financial-news website
E*Trade• controls 14% of the online brokerage, strategic
acquisitions are bringing tens of thousands of new investors into the fold every month
• went to Vietnam, Purple Heart and a Bronze Star for valor, College, cargo handler for FedEx 20 years,
• In 1996 joined E*Trade, Cotsakos moved the company to the Web
• a financial portal--a one-stop-shopping money marketplace where you'll be able to invest, insure, shop, get financial news and even bank
15. Sony Corp.
Nobuyuki Idei THE ENTERTAINERPresident and CEO
NET WORTH $5 millionAGE 62
ADDRESS www.sony.com
Sony Corp.
• Everyone owns a Sony something
• movies, music, video games, even robotic companionship
• The king of all this cool stuff is Nobuyuki Idei, co-CEO of the $56 billion company
• focus on home networking--linking all those (Sony) gadgets, entertainment systems and appliances elsewhere in the house
Sony Corp.• next version of Sony‘s hugely popular
PlayStation game console, due out in Japan in late 1999, will do more than knock your eyes out with graphics-rich games; it will become the nerve center of the networked living room
• Sony's & Microsoft are partners in WebTV and co-developed a digital-music format called MS Audio
• The chip that powers PlayStation 2 could be the sword that slays the Wintel dragon
16. Kleiner Perkins Caufield & Byers, Partner
John Doerr V.C. JOHNNY APPLESEED
AGE 47E-MAIL [email protected]
KPCB• venture capitalist John Doerr's handshake
is the most golden
• best-known venture-capital firms to back small high-tech start-ups over the past two decades. (Sun, Netscape, Intuit, Compaq)
• The recent flood of cash for new Internet companies has only enhanced the currency of Doerr's judgments
• @Home, Excite
• Amazon director, Drugstore.com
17. Hewlett-Packard Co.
Carly Fiorina MAKEOVER ARTISTPresident and CEO
NET WORTH $2.2 billionAGE 45
ADDRESS www.hp.com
Hewlett-Packard Co.• Chosen in July to lead the world's second
biggest computer company• from a stodgy company best known for its
printers to a compelling Internet player• the first outsider to hold a top position at the
60-year-old Silicon Valley institution • the first woman to head a Dow 30 company. • "e-services"--technologies that help
companies with e-commerce• refocus HP's image
Hewlett-Packard Co.• medieval-history and philosophy major at
Stanford University
• dropped out of law school after a semester and joined AT&T as a sales rep
• 20 years later, left Lucent as one of the most powerful female executives in the U.S.
• Deals with Yahoo and Oracle signal that Fiorina is serious about making HP a true Internet company.
18. IBM Corp.
Louis V. Gerstner Jr. E-BIZ BRASS
Chairman and CEOAGE 57
ADDRESS www.ibm.com
IBM
• pulling IBM out of an $8 billion hole and putting it $6 billion in the black
• turn staid Big Blue into a giant, cutting-edge EC and computer-services company
• clients include Monsanto & Charles Schwab.
• delivered a 21% increase in global services revenue for 1998 and an additional 19% jump ($15.5 billion) in this year's first half
• stock up 1,200% since he took the reins 1993
IBM• As it strives to become everybody's e-
business adviser, IBM faces tough competition from new players like Intel Corp. and old consulting stalwarts McKinsey (worked as a director for 13 years) and Andersen Consulting.
• Earlier this year IBM struck a deal with Nintendo to build the brains of the video-game company's next-generation console, which will go head to head with Sony's next PlayStation. Now that's hip.
19. Secure Digital Music Initiative
Leonardo Chiariglione FATHER OF MP3Executive Director
AGE 46ADDRESS www.cselt.stet.it/leonardo
Secure Digital Music Initiative• unleashed the MP3 genie, now leading music-
industry to get it back in the bottle• create universal standards for digital audio and
video• produced the first specs for "secure," copy-
protected, portable devices• 1992 set the standards for compressing digital
audio into smaller, more manageable file sizes known as MP3
• First-generation sdmi-compliant players that play MP3s (ship for the holidays)
20. U.S. District Court
Thomas Penfield Jackson WINDOWS WATCHER
U.S. District JudgeAGE 62
ADDRESS www.dcd.uscourts.gov
Thomas Penfield Jackson• There is no jury in the Microsoft antitrust trial, so
it will be up to Judge Thomas Penfield Jackson to determine whether the software giant has abused its monopoly on the desktop--and, if so, what to do about it.
• Judge Jackson initially said he could run through the trial in six weeks, but his leanings showed themselves when he allowed trustbusters to expand the case beyond Netscape and the browser wars to look at Microsoft's muscle throughout the computer industry
Thomas Penfield Jackson
• BEST LINE "Assume Microsoft is a monopoly--would [it] then be anti-competitive?"
• Judge Jackson's decision, no matter what it is, will have huge reverberations throughout the high-tech world and affect the economy in general
21. Softbank
Masayoshi Son THE INTERNET'S FINACIER
ChairmanNET WORTH $8 billion
AGE 42ADDRESS www.softbank.co.jp
Softbank• Korean heritage • dominated the Japanese software industry
early on, scoring a deal to distribute Microsoft products just as a kanji-friendly version of Windows hit it big.
• He's facing off against his onetime Redmond partner, brandishing a robust stock portfolio (he was an early backer of Yahoo) and a venture fund that has raised $1 billion for new investments like Webvan, the ambitious online grocery chain
Softbank• Past performance is not a guarantee of
future results. With venture-capital investments at an all-time high, Son may find himself buying high and selling low if the market turns sour on Internet companies.
22. Vulcan Northwest Inc.
Paul G. Allen THE CABLE GUY
ChairmanNET WORTH $30 billion
AGE 46ADDRESS www.paulallen.com
Vulcan Northwest Inc.• best known as the co-founder of Microsoft , left
in 1983 (found have Hodgkin's disease)
• recovered, relaxed for a while, then got busy again
• busy building a portfolio of noncable, new-media holdings--potential service and content providers for the high-speed Internet service
• investments include Internet portal Go2Net, e-commerce websites Drugstore.com and Priceline.com, and technology information hub CNET
Vulcan Northwest Inc.• Charter Comm., the fourth largest operator in
the country, with 6.2 million subscribers. • side projects:building a museum in hometown
Seattle dedicated to American popular music open next summer
• also building a new stadium for his beloved Seattle Seahawks football team
• He owns the NBA's Portland Trailblazers too• need some serious upgrades to be a real
contender against cable giants AT&T and Time Warner in the broadband market.
23. Oracle Corp.
Lawrence Ellison THE REDMOND RIVALCo-Founder and CEO
NET WORTH $8.2 billionAGE 55
ADDRESS www.oracle.com
Oracle Corp.• the leading provider of database software for
businesses
• moved aggressively into another hot business area--software that links a corporation's strategic departments--and scared that market's leader, Germany's SAP.
• got an eye on an even bigger prize: the network computer
• Ellison's vision of the future of network computing hits a big snag: cheap PCs
24. Nokia Corp.
Jorma Ollila THE WIRELESS WONDER
Chairman and CEOAGE 49
ADDRESS www.nokia.com
Nokia Corp.• No one makes more mobile phones than
Finland's Nokia--this year more than 70 million units
• once you can get the Net on your phone, sales will zoom toward 1 billion
• remake Nokia into a kind of wireless Cisco, providing the plumbing to manage all the airwave traffic
• Internet will be unbound from the desktop, turning e-mail and the Web into everywhere, all-the-time experiences
Nokia Corp.• new standards for so-called 3G (third
generation) wireless that will handle Internet connections as fast as cable modems
• Symbian, which got Nokia, Motorola, Ericsson and Psion to cooperate on a handheld operating system that's not owned by Bill Gates.
• Nokia becomes the perfect hybrid, combining the gotta-have design sense of Apple with the no-nonsense business acumen of Cisco
25. Excite@Home Corp.
Tom (T. J.) Jermoluk and George Bell BROADBAND BUDDIES
Chairman and CEO; PresidentNET WORTH $100 million; $50 million
AGE both 42E-MAIL [email protected] [email protected]
Excite@Home Corp.• broadband's odd couple
• @Home merged with Excite in May
• Jermoluk, former CEO of cable-modem Internet-service provider @Home, and Bell, who ran Excite
• Bell, a former TV producer and reporter, CEO and employee No. 26 at Excite
• Cable giants like AT&T, Cox and Comcast control most of its shares
26. MCI WorldCom
Bernie Ebbers KING OF THE WORLDCOM
President and CEONET WORTH $1 billion
AGE 58ADDRESS www.wcom.com
MCI WorldCom• telecom empire for the next millennium
• a third of the U.S. Internet traffic flowed over MCI WorldCom's network
• second only to AT&T among long-distance carriers
• making its initial move into the wireless world by acquiring SkyTel for $1.3 billion in stock
• the largest paging companies, SkyTel was the first to offer two-way text messaging
MCI WorldCom• Part of the company's high-speed data
network failed for an astonishing 10 days, causing a high-profile outage
• The 3,000 business customers that were affected included Internet service providers, banks and the Chicago Board of Trade
• Ebbers must prevent customers who lost business during the outage from going elsewhere
• offering wireless broadband services
27. Pokemon
Pokemon GAME CRAZE DU JOURNET WORTH $5 billion
AGE 1ADDRESS www.pokemon.com
Pokemon• Pikachu hypnotize our kids, empty our
pocketbooks and create the biggest game sensation in memory
• more than $5 billion in international sales
• best-selling video game in the U.S.
• 4.2 million Game Boy and Nintendo 64 cartridges have been sold
• 1 million trading-card packs sold
Pokemon• kids must link their Game Boys up with
those of friends and make trades
• Pokemon Yellow, the first Pokemon title for Game Boy Color, will be released Oct. 18, and the Pokemon movie is scheduled for Nov. 12.
28. Priceline
Jay Walker THE BUYER'S AGENT
Founder and vice chairmanNET WORTH $3.2 billion
AGE 43E-MAIL [email protected]
Priceline
• The stock, which had soared as high as $165, had settled at $66 now
• "name-your-price" model for selling airline tickets and hotel reservations showed people how you can rewrite the rules for doing business on the Internet
• new online companies: eWanted.com, Mygeek.com following the "buyer's agent" model.
Priceline• Walker's influence is clear, even if
Priceline's path to profitability still isn't
• expanding their shopping model to car buying and home mortgages.
• Coming soon: groceries.
29. Lucasfilm Ltd.
George Lucas STAR WARRIOR
Founder and chairmanNET WORTH $2 billion
AGE 55ADDRESS www.lucasfilm.com
Lucasfilm Ltd.
• Of the movie's 2,200 shots, 1,965 were digitally enhanced.
• Lucas is building a new digital studio at the Presidio in San Francisco.
• Oh, yeah, and he's also writing the next episode
30. CMGI
David Wetherell THE INCUBATOR
Chairman and CEONET WORTH $3 billion
AGE 44ADDRESS www.cmgi.com
CMGI• Wetherell started College Marketing
Group Inc. in 1994 to sell textbooks to college professors
• invest in Booklink, which he later sold to AOL for a cool $70 million, and Lycos
• made a career of buying stakes in promising Internet upstarts, nurturing their growth with money and good advice and then selling them or taking them public
CMGI• CMGI has invested in more than 30
companies in the past four years
• Lycos (search engine), CMGI owns 18.5% $2 million 1995 worth $750 million today
• His one regret: passing on eBay, a mistake he calculates cost him $4 billion.
31. EDventure Holdings
Esther Dyson MISTRESS OF YOUR DOMAINS
ChairwomanNET WORTH $5 million
AGE 48E-MAIL [email protected]
EDventure Holdings
• the Internet Corp. for Assigned Names and Numbers
• a nonprofit given the unenviable task of figuring out how to award domain names
• Dyson defended ICANN's neutrality and, when the nonprofit faced bankruptcy, raised $650,000 in donations from MCI WorldCom and Cisco
• she plans to call for consumer-friendly marketing on the Net.
32. idealab!
Bill Gross IDEA MAN
Founder and chairmanAGE 41
ADDRESS www.idealab.com
idealab!• Bill Gross's companies, eToys and
GoTo.com, made big splashes
• eToys has thrown bricks-and-mortar baron Toys 'R' Us into turmoil
• launched some 30 companies in the past three years
• giving away free PCs in exchange for the right to track consumers' surfing habits, attracted more than a million applicants
idealab!• His strategy is: pool knowledge for all his
start-ups, then spit out laser-focused sites such as WeddingChannel.com and PayMyBills.com that fill a useful niche.
• idealab! is set to open new incubators in San Francisco, New York, Boston and London.
33. Merrill Lynch
Henry M. Blodget THE FORECASTER
Senior Internet and e-commerce analystAGE 32
ADDRESS www.ml.com
Henry M. Blodget
• arguably the most influential voice on Internet stocks in the world
• Blodget warns investors who don't have the stomach for volatility to stay away from Net stocks. No one knows when the bubble will burst.
34. drkoop.com
C. Everett Koop CYBER DOC
ChairmanAGE 82
ADDRESS www.drkoop.com
drkoop.com• He's the oldest and perhaps least-wired
guy on the list
• Its IPO in June was one of the year's hottest, more than doubling in its first day
• new health sites launching every month, reputation as "America's Doctor" gives him the recognized brand-name edge
• been criticized for capitalizing on his nine years of public service.
• Koop gets stock and 2% to 4% of sales
35. John Markoff
John Markoff THE BYLINEReporter
NET WORTH "Enough to live in San Francisco"AGE 49
ADDRESS [email protected]
John Markoff• reporter who has the most influence on
what the American knows about technology
• in 1988 told mainstream America about the Internet through his reporting
• And today, after more than two decades reporting on technology, he is the man who tells people what to make of what's going on in the valley
37. Sega Enterprises
Shoichiro Irimajiri DREAM MACHINISTPresident and CEO
AGE 59ADDRESS www.sega.com
Shoichiro Irimajiri• took over as president of Sega in February
1998
• Dreamcast, Sega's 128-bit attempt to re-establish a good name
• Sega is facing its third year of financial losses (last fiscal year's hit was an ugly $375 million)
• the release of the Dreamcast gives the company some cause for optimism
• great-looking 3-D graphics and 56K modem for online game play
38. Qwest Communications
Joseph Nacchio BELL BUYER
Co-Chairman and CEONET WORTH $200 million
AGE 50 ADDRESS www.qwest.com
Joseph Nacchio• Qwest began life as a "carrier's carrier,"
selling bandwidth to all comers
• Nacchio will have to prove that U S West is more than just another boring Baby Bell; promoting dsl and Net access is key
39. Handspring
Donna Dubinsky and Jeff Hawkins GADGET GURUS
Founder, CEO; founder,Chief Product OfficerAGES 44, 42
ADDRESS www.handspring.com
Handspring• After PalmPilot, they have created a new
company and developed a handheld computer
• Visor can morph into any handheld device, from a pager to an MP3 player to a global-positioning satellite receiver
• PalmPilot targeted business users• $150 Visor is for 13-year-old gamers to 70-
year-old grandmas, • market potential much larger than the 2
million PalmPilot devotees.
40. Internet Entertainment Group
Seth Warshavsky LARRY FLYNT OF THE INTERNET
President and CEOAGE 26
ADDRESS www.ieg.com
Internet Entertainment Group• Sex doesn't sell on its own, it needs
someone to get it to market• no one is better at packaging it online than
Seth Warshavsky• IEG acquired the homemade sex video of
Pamela Anderson and Tommy Lee and then broadcast it online
• posted nude photos of Dr. Laura Schlesinger. Guess what? It works
• 100,000 subscribers paid $24.95 a month for basic access to clublove.com
Internet Entertainment Group• into gambling (goldenoasis.com), psychic
advice (psychiczone.com), get-rich-quick real estate investment programs (zerodown.com)
• IEG Medical Services, takes Web orders for Viagra
• pay-per-view webcasts of live brain surgery and sex-change operations
• profits this year were $15 million
Internet Entertainment Group• company's highly respected infrastructure
includes a fraud-control database that weeds out bad credit cards and its own "push" technology to broadcast video through an unenhanced browser window
• Warshavsky's biggest test: Will Wall Street do a Web porn IPO? Top-tier underwriters DLJ and Goldman Sachs have already passed
41. RealNetworks
Rob Glaser CEOBIT STREAMER
NET WORTH $2 billionAGE 37
ADDRESS www.real.com
RealNetworks• playing both sides: releasing RealJukebox this
spring, he embraced MP3--but included support for secure music formats
• used by some 7 million people• streaming media players still have 85% of the
market despite head-on competition from Microsoft
• Microsoft's WebTV devices due to support RealAudio this fall
• AOL purchase Nullsoft, maker of the Winamp, gives Glaser a new competitor
42. Gomez Advisors
Julio Gomez, CEO RANK KING
AGE 39ADDRESS www.gomez.com
Gomez Advisors• Julio Gomez and his advisers rank e-
businesses for their value, customer service and cool features
• becoming e-commerce's answer to Consumer Reports
• Gomez spent 10 years in investment banking before moving to Forrester Research
• plans to rank 10 new categories of e-businesses, including sporting goods, mortgages and insurance
• will on old-fashioned media like TV and radio
43. Symantec
John W. Thompson, AGE 50THE ANTIVIRUS GUARDIAN
Chairman, President and CEONET WORTH $3.5 million
E-MAIL [email protected]
Symantec• the only African-American CEO of a major
Silicon Valley company
• The company has grown steadily this year, even as competitor Network Associates has seen its market cap shrink drastically
• create an image for Symantec as strong as that of its Norton Utilities product
• spun off a division that makes tools for software developers, allowing Symantec to focus more on security
44. Diamond Multimedia Systems
Bill Schroeder RIO GRANDE
President and CEONET WORTH $4 million
AGE 55E-MAIL [email protected]
Diamond Multimedia Systems• Rio 300 blasted way past the Recording
Industry Association of America in court last year
• making way for a portable MP3 music players that will change listening habits
• shipped nearly a quarter-million Rio units in its first 10 months.
• Graphics chip maker S3 is acquiring the company
45. Third Age Media
Mary Furlong BOOMER BULLHORN
CEO, AGE 50E-MAIL www.thirdage.com
Third Age Media• Third Age website is the community spot for
the over-50 crowd online• In June, Furlong published the homey, how-to
Grown-up's Guide to Computing • her book, which will focus on how the
"generation that changed everything is changing it again" (this time with technology)
• hoped to do for older adults what Joan Ganz Cooney, creator of Sesame Street, did for kids: understand and give them what they want and need, at the right time
46. Security Dynamics
Jim Bidzos SECRETS AGENT MAN
Vice ChairmanNET WORTH "low nine figures"
AGE 44ADDRESS www.rsa.com
Security Dynamics• RSA Data Security, the Security Dynamics
subsidiary he retired from this year, has long held the keys to encryption on the Web
• latest venture is SpendCash.com, which is developing a cash card that may open up e-commerce for teenagers and families without credit cards
• privacy of SpendCash.com's currency may prove attractive even to credit-card holders
• annual RSA Conference puts him at the center of the secure Web.
Maxis• Wright belongs on this list just on the
continuing strength of his decade-old SimCity
• Electronic Arts(owns Maxis studio) shipped more than a million copies of SimCity 3000
• People opposed to violent first-person shooters like Quake and Doom
• crafting simulations ever since he was a boy
• due early next year, it's a hit if people start making real-life decisions based on the way things played out in The Sims
48. W.R. Hambrecht + Co.
Bill Hambrecht MOONSHOT KILLER
Founder, Chairman and CEONET WORTH $500 million
AGE 63
W.R. Hambrecht + Co.
• Silicon Valley is filled with early retirees--entrepreneurs, venture capitalists and investment bankers who have made their money from technology and are kicking back
• first-day gains so many Internet IPOs saw were a product of a bad process
• introduced OpenIPO, a new "Dutch auction" technique that in theory turns those first-day gains into cash for the company going public, not for lucky traders
W.R. Hambrecht + Co.
• Ravenswood Winery and Salon.com went public through Hambrecht's auctions, but a third OpenIPO offering, GreatFood.com, postponed its auction in May, citing stock-market conditions. With investors less inclined to propel new Internet stocks to nosebleed heights, could Hambrecht be fixing a system that's not broken?
49. TheStreet.com
Jim Cramer, AGE 44 Street Smartypants
Co-Founder and ColumnistNET WORTH $58 million
E-MAIL [email protected]
TheStreet.com• His "trading turret" reports arm do-it-yourself
Web investors going up against Wall Street
• TheStreet.com grown from a one-man soapbox into an online-news organization
• went public earlier this year, seeing its shares first inflate to unearthly heights, then fall back to earth
• Tokyo Joe has more than 1,000 investors paying $100 a month to read his online tipsheet
50. Mattel
Barbie, DollTHE BIT GIRL
NET WORTH $1.9 billion (1998 sales)AGE 40
ADDRESS www.mattel.com
Barbie
• is snowboarding in the new Super Sports CD-ROM and sleuthing at a carnival in another CD-ROM, Barbie Detective.
• Barbie's Ocean Discovery, Game Boy title
• $599 computer with pink and silver accents and a low-cost printer from Hewlett-Packard
• The first Barbie PlayStation title, a competitive, equestrian-themed game called Barbie Race and Ride, comes out this fall
• Two CD-ROM will be out for the holiday
